Splash n Dash: Exppress Car Wash

Photography: Mohd Nasir

In India, washing a car has always been the job of either the chauffer or the local man who takes just a few hundred rupees every month for a mundane attempt at the job. There are two kinds of Indians, one that is very easily pleased and another who isn’t. The job that the local men and drivers do is satisfactory to the majority of the population who are easily pleased. For the rest of us who care a lot about our cars, there is only one solution. We take it to our local fuel pump where we get it washed with a high pressure hose and maybe even opt for a decent basic polish inside and out and that’s about it. But that is usually very time consuming and costs the earth for no reason.

But if you want a good long lasting rub down or buffing, detailing and cleaning, then you have help at hand and that too at reasonable prices. There is a new kid on the block called Exppress Car Wash, a fully automated car cleaning service that operates through 15 outlets in the entire National Capital Region and a total of 40 across the country. They have some fully automated and some semi automated car cleaning facilities around the city. They are also slowly expanding their reach across India. Thus, when they invited us to bring our car, I took Rudyard (I call my Ford Figo hatch by that name!) down to one of their fully automated cleaning outlets in Hauz Khas, (at the Indian Oil petrol pump right opposite Siri Fort) to check out their cleaning abilities for myself.

Karan Sethi, Director of Manmachine Works, the company that operates Exppress Car Wash briefed us about the new service. “We have just launched a new concept called Exppress Car Wash. We have tried to make the customers experience comfort and convenience where he or she can come and get their car washed and leave within 20 minutes,” he said.

We opted for their basic cleaning, which was a simple exterior job. The process involved the use of a special high pressure hose with which the dirt on top was washed off. Then they cleaned all the dirt on the sides, the front, back and the wheel arches with this “Special hose” and cleaned out all of the weeks’ worth of muck. They even got to the radiator. Then the car was placed near the giant blue and yellow brushes which first had a mechanical high pressure sprayer that cleaned the underbody of the car in no more than 3 minutes. Then the automatic machine sprayed some cleaning agent all over the car and rapidly started spinning the massive brushes and closed in on the car to start the cleaning process. After going from the front to the back and then back to front and another quick cycle, the spinning stopped. A beam that ran across the top lowered down and sprayed another environment friendly agent on the car that was sort of like a polish/wax and then blew it dry. Once the machine stopped, the process was over and the car was squeaky clean.